On the first day of 1935, in a farmhouse in a rural area of south Georgia, an 83-year-old man died, and within two hours his granddaughter was born in the same house. He was John W. Ham, my 2d great-grandfather, who was one of the oldest citizens of Wilcox County in south Georgia. He had a large family — four sons and five daughters — and was well known in the county, having been county treasurer at one point. He lived five miles east of Rochelle, in the Mt. Horeb area.
The baby, his granddaughter, was named Gladys, after her mother.
She grew up to have a full, active life, but never knew her grandfather…or her father. January 1935 was a difficult month for the Ham family. Gladys’ father, Charles L. Ham, only 34 years old, died unexpectedly three days after her birth, on January 4. He was described in the local newspaper as a “young man of fine character and had many friends in the county who will be grieved to learn of his death.” He left his wife and two children. He and his family lived in his father’s house, and he worked their farm, and was also trained as a printer, like much of the family.
My great-grandfather, Clifford W. Ham, signed the death certificate as the informant; the cause of death was apparently not known. Clifford himself would be dead eighteen months later, of complications of malarial fever, a common problem in Georgia at the time.
